Chapter 3: Mercy?
Third Precept of Zote: Don't kill things thoughtlessly. While your out adventuring, it may feel like second nature to just kill anything and everything that attacks you. But remember, those creatures have lives to. And sometimes, a good reason for attacking you. So before you strike the killing blow, make sure that it's necessary, and not just a matter of convenience.
As much as I wanted to just lay on the ground and sulk for a moment or two, I knew that getting used as a practice dummy by a mind-controlled mass of muscle and moss would be even more emotionally exhausting. So, in the moment after the Moss-Kinight swung their raised nail, I rolled to the side, letting it hit the stone and dirt beneath harmlessly.
Say what you want about having an annoyingly light body, it was nice to be able to shift your entire mass with a slight motion. Case in point, it took only one, solid, one handed shove to throw myself back into a standing position. By the time the Moss-Knight had turned to adjust for my change in location, I'd drawn Life-ender and fallen into a crouch.
'Should I fight him?' I wondered. 'No. Not worth it. And besides, it's not their fault they're doing this . . . now how to get past them?' Unfortunately, we were in a somewhat narrow room, and the only way's out appeared to be straight up, and past the Mosskin solider. And seeing how I couldn't fly, that left me with trying to slip past a guard who had already seen me. At least his training was a non sequitur right now.
But before I could come up with a proper plan, the Moss-Knight was upon me again, darting forward and putting it's entire body weight into the swing. Thinking fast, I lifted Life ender over my head and placed my free hand on the flat of the blade almost halfway down it's length. The Mosskin's nail struck the improvised shells-wood ramp and skittered off, skidding down and to the left of me.
The force of the blow was still enough to drive me to one knee, but I didn't falter. And better, in the moment immediately following the attack, the moss-knight was off balance, most of their weight being on one leg. With a burst of speed I didn't know I had in me, I rose back to my feet, braced myself, stabbed Life-ender into the gab between the Mosskins legs and wrenched to the side with all my might. This proved to be enough to knock the far heavier bug clean off their feet.
Not wanting to give them a chance to recover, I hopped over them, managing to avoid my usual loss of balance, and reach the ledge. But upon my second leap, I once again miscalculated. Only, instead of my balance, it was a matter of distance. I cleared the ledge entirely and fell down the opposite side, where I flopped to the ground. "OOF! . . . well, at least I get that moment of sulking I was hoping for . . . "
I lay there for several seconds, unmoving aside from the minor shifts brought about by my breathing. It wasn't due to any form of pain, the fall was trifling at best. Nor was it exhaustion, I still felt fresh and full of energy, at least physically.
No, rather I felt tired emotionally. The kind of tired one gets after loosing ones temper a couple of times back to back. If I'd actually needed rest I would have taken a more dignified position against the wall, but what I needed was to just shut my mind down for a few minutes.
But the knight caught up to me in only a few seconds, having navigated the platforms over the Mosskin-guards. They stood on the platform above me, looking down in silence, and I suddenly felt the urge to defend myself.
"What? Never seen a bug relaxing before?" I hopped back to my feet and put my hands on my hips "Well maybe you should try it some time! May give you a different perspective on things!" The knight, of course, didn't respond.
I sighed and began to adjust my cloak nervously. "Well, I guess that's enough relaxing for the time being. I assume you have something you want to do next?"
The knight nodded once, and pointed back up towards the ledge I'd just fallen from. No, that was wrong. It was set on a similar(slightly lower) level, but on the opposite side. "Up there?" Nod. "You see another path?" Shake. "Something you want?" Pause, nod. "Well, alright then. Lets go check it out then."
I'd like to say that I managed the join the Knight on the first platform in only one try. And indeed, I would have. After all, I'd managed to compensate for my horns with a head tilt as I shoved off. Unfortunately, right as I landed, I got my legs tangled in my cloak and stumbled back off again. 'Note to self. Shorten cloak a bit.'
My second try was far more successful, fortunately, and I managed to make it up to the previously indicated ledge without further incident. "See? I made it up." The knight stared blankly for a moment, then turned to jump up to the ledge. I hiked up by cape and followed them, this time managing not to fall flat on my face.
"Alright, what caught your eye?" The Knight pointed across the room under the ledge, at a rough iron grate in the wall. Through the grate, a depressed looking Grub trapped in a glass jar could be seen. "Ah! I see! You want to free that pitiful creature from it's cell, is that it?" Nod. "Do you have a key?" Pause, shake. "Alright . . . well, I suppose that we should actually check to see how the doors work before deciding it's impossible."
I hoped down from the ledge without further comment, and marched over to the little cell with purpose in my stride. However, as I grew nearer, I trod onto a moss-coated section of floor, that seemed to vibrate in response to the pressure. I instantly hopped back, already knowing what was coming.
The moss and vine coated wall to my left exploded outwards as another Moss-knight came bursting outwards, shield and nail in hand(claw?). It was larger than the last one I'd faced, though not by much, and it's moss-beard was thicker and shaggier. Around it's shoulder was a thread of simple string, on which a shiny bronze key was hung. Oh, and it looked angry.
I retreated back to the ledge where the knight was still standing, balls of spiny thorns hitting the ground behind me. Once I was back onto the platform, I immediately fell flat onto my stomach, dragging the knight down with me, and peaked back over the edge at the Mosskin solider.
"It's guarded." I declared redundantly, as yet another ball of spines flew over our heads. "I think we should-STAY DOWN!" The Knight had grabbed their nail with one hand and tried to get back to their feet, only for me to force them back down. "Honestly! Short sighted adventurous types . . . " I groaned.
"Think!" I pointed at the Moss-knight. "That thing is infected! It doesn't actually want to fight you . . . probably . . . probably, maybe, I don't know the local laws, and we may have done something illgal . . . what was their punishment system like, did they-no! That doesn't matter right now!" I cleared my throat.
"Either way, just because it's attacking you, doesn't mean you should attack it back! You need to discriminate a bit more!" I got a long, blank stare in response to that declaration.
I palmed my forehead and groaned."Alright, look. You see the Mosskin, right?" The knight nodded. "And look there by it's waist. You see the key, right?" Another nod. "Alright then. Logically speaking, that key is likely the key to the gate that's between us and the Grub, right?" Nod. "So, we just need that key to get the grub, right?" Nod. "Now . . . do we need to kill the guard to get the key?"
Now this brought about a long pause. In fact, it was probably the single longest pause I'd ever gotten from the knight. But in the end, it slowly, hesitantly, shook it's head.
"Alright, so if we don't need to kill the Mosskin, why should we? I don't know about you, but I wouldn't want to be killed just because someone decided it's easier than keeping me alive. If your going to kill something, at least be sure that there aren't any other options available first . . . of course there are a lot of exceptions to that rule, dangerous beasts, prolific serial killers, those undead husk things, carniv-"
"Ptu!""Twack!"
A ball of spines hit me right between the eyes, jostling my sku- head-carapace, painfully and showering my head in thorny vines.
The knight stared for a second as I brushed the thorns off. Then they reached for their nail again. I groaned. "Right. You know what? You distract the guard, I'll steal the key and free the grub. If I free the grub before you beat the guard, then we just leave the guard un-beaten. That sound good to you?"
The knight nodded and crawled back into a standing position, launching itself towards the Mosskin guard with surprising speed. The two began a tense, slow dance of blades. The knight darting in, the Mosskin blocking with their shield and then countering as the knight stepped backwards out of range.
But, as much as it was a dance, it was also . . . strangely static? Put simply, the Mosskin moved mechanically, like a robot. Never changing it's strategy of "approach and attack". The knight meanwhile seemed to be working off of a strategy of "wait for an attack then counter". It would wait for an attack, dash in close, launch one or two powerful attacks, then back off as soon as the Mosskin began to attack again weather they hit or not.
I was half tempted to just stand back and watch to fight, but I reminded myself of my goal. The key dangling from a string on the Moss-knight's shoulder. So I stood back and waited for an opening.
For the most part, the Mosskin reacted to everything the knight did quite quickly. Weather it was jumping over them, or just trying to work around their guard, they always manage to have their shield up in time, it seemed. Always, except for the brief periods of recovery after launching a truly powerful swing. Then the knight could close the distance and land a blow on them before they regained their stance.
Then something strange happened. It was around the third or fourth time that the knight began to taunt a big swing out of the Mosskin, only this time, it seems that the Knight's reflexes had failed it. The Mosskins nail flashed through the air, as it had several times before, but unlike those times, it now found it's target.
A sound like a muffled, warped explosion rippled through the air, a crack and flash of black and white flowing outward from the knight. The Mosskin's nail, rather than knocking the knight backwards, seemed to pass through their body, doing no visible damage to there black shell.
Then the knight was leaping into the air at the Mosskins head and I found myself charging in as well.
The Knight's blow rung true, thundering into the shell of the Moss-Knights head with a loud crack, but failing to move them any notable amount. But it did seem to gain the Moss Knights full attention, a fact that I was happy to take advantage of.
I threw myself at the air just to the left of the Mosskin as it began to turn around to follow the Knight, one arms outstretched to grab the key. I ripped the key from the Mosskins chest, hit the ground in a roll, and landed on my feet, cloak billowing behind me heroically.
"HAHA!" I cheered in glee, though I didn't let the moment of victory distract me from my purpose, and rushed over to the locked gate a stuck the key into the lock. A single turn of the key later, and the grate was sliding into the ground.
The Grub, which had been sulking in obvious depression for the duration of the time I'd seen it, suddenly perked up and began to bonce in place, making little cheering noises. I took Life-ender in hand, and reeled back my arm to strike the glass. The Grub crouched down in preparation. I swung!
"Ting!"
"Bwaaa . . . "
And Life ender glanced of the glass, to the Grubs disappointment. For roughly three seconds, I stood there frozen. Then I began to beat my wooden nail into the glass dome with the fury of a mad man.
"Ting, Ting, Ting, ting, ting ting ting tine tine-ting-ting-ting-ting-!" "GRAAAAAA!"
Finally, with a bellow of rage, I threw away my nail, grabbed the glass jar with both hands, and heaved it into the air. Grub squealing, I let myself go limp, letting the glass jar fall to the floor with my weight on top of it.
It seemed that gravity and weight could only do so much damage though, and the glass only cracked, not breaking. But I wasn't letting that stop me, and I dug my fingers into the cracks. I crushed by way through, and once I had a hand-hold, I pried the edges apart, splitting the glass apart and letting the grub spill out like the yoke from a cracked egg.
"AH-HA! There you are, little one! Free from you cage!"
The grub lay there in a confused daze for a moment, but soon enough it seemed to register what it was I'd just said. Leaping to it's feet, it bounced in place, warbling happily, before digging into the ground.
I nodded once in satisfaction, a warm fuzzy feeling filling my chest, but the sound of combat reminded of my purpose. Turning back to the duelling duo, I charged forward, life ender once again at the ready. "THE GRUBS FREE!" I bellowed, throwing myself into a full force swipe at the Moss-Knights leg. "COME ON! LET'S GET OUT OF HERE!"
As a consequence of my blow, the Mosskin was sent teetering off balance, giving me a chance to dash off without further conflict, the knight following a few steps behind me.
AN: Well this took way to long to write. On day I'm deciding to put off working on it until tomorrow and the next thing I know it's been ten days and I'm only half done. And even now I don't think I like it that much. Definitely my least favourite chapter so far. Hopefully the next chapter comes easier.